NOMA BAR - the illustrious guide to perception

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- The dualities within Noma’s work mirror his life. This fascination with the essence of the story and a translation of this into a beautiful and profound image is a struggle on which he thrives. In the spirit of Bittersweet I ask him to try and sum himself up in two words.

He pauses, furrows his brow beneath his ever present hat, then smiles: “Always More!” -

- Owen Pritchard

NOMA BAR - the illustrious guide to perception is an editorial artifact that represents the final project for the Bachelor thesis in Graphic Design at Accademia di Belle Arti di Catania. The first step of the project consist in the analysis of the world of visual perception, starting from the laws developed by Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka and Wolfgang Köhler in the XX century, that define what is called the Gestaltpsychologie; the notorious studies of Gaetano Kanizsa about the perceptual phenomenon which also concern the field of psychology, and the studies of the nobel prize winner Eric R. Kandel, which combines art and neuroscience analyzing brain behaviors in response to perceptive stimulus throughout the centuries.

Although some aspects of this topic may often appear complicated to learn or understand, what is being discussed is a very simple concept and describe automatic processes that occur instantly within the mind of every human being. The aim of the thesis is to observe and deepen these processes, followed by the work of the extraordinary Noma Bar, an Israeli designer. The approach of the figure of Noma Bar to this topic takes place in a natural and instinctive way, as the designer's genius lies in the constant use of these laws and principles that mark the phases of visual perception.

The work produced by a designer who decides to rely on these principles and respect them is a work that communicates its message in a functional way: adding the fact that Bar, as well as being a visionary capable of masterfully using these laws, also has strong opinions on the most varied topics and part of his work is to convey these opinions to the observer.The result obtained is the work of the graphic designer carried out to perfection. As Paul Rand (1914-1996) writes: "The idea is the result of careful study and observation. Design is the product of this idea".

The path that is implemented in this thesis is to support the laws of visual perception to all the work of Noma Bar, as if they walked along side by side, thus explaining the meaning of each process, demonstrating why we are often held to observe a certain figure more than once before stopping at its appearance, and therefore presenting immediate examples that describe all the scientific aspects that are enclosed behind all those that, at first sight, are defined only as “curious illustrations”, or again, “optical illusions”. It is important to specify that every artifact made by Bar contains more than one law; the one that is chosen and juxtaposed to each illustration is the one that prevails in the general configuration.